Home / International / International -- News Tools: Save | Print | E-mail | Most Read
Media: Blair Expected to Announce Major Troop Withdrawal from Iraq
Adjust font size:

Prime Minister Tony Blair is expected to announce on Wednesday the first phase withdrawal of British troops from Iraq in several weeks, British media said.

Blair would tell the House of Commons that the first batch of 1,500 British soldiers would return home within weeks, The British Broadcasting Corp. said on Tuesday night, quoting unidentified government sources.

Blair will also tell the parliament that a total of about 3,000British soldiers will have left southern Iraq by the end of 2007, if the security there is sufficient, the BBC said.

But The Guardian newspaper, citing unnamed officials, said Blair on Wednesday would order 1,000 soldiers out of Iraq in the early summer, with all of the troops out by the end of 2008.

So far, a spokesman at the prime minister's Downing Street office declined to comment on the reports.

Currently, Britain deployed over 7,000 troops in southern Iraq, most in the Basra area and about 800 in Maysan province. Up to 132British soldiers have been killed in Iraq since the start of the Iraq War.

(Xinhua News Agency February 21, 2007)

Tools: Save | Print | E-mail | Most Read

Related Stories
> Korean Nuclear Talks
> Middle East Peace Process
> Iran Nuclear Issue
> Reconstruction of Iraq
> 6th SCO Summit Meeting
Links
- China Development Gateway
- Foreign Ministry
- Network of East Asian Think-Tanks
- China-EU Association
- China-Africa Business Council
- China Foreign Affairs University
- University of International Relations
- Institute of World Economics & Politics
- Institute of Russian, East European & Central Asian Studies
- Institute of West Asian & African Studies
- Institute of Latin American Studies
- Institute of Asia-Pacific Studies
- Institute of Japanese Studies
SiteMap | About Us | RSS | Newsletter | Feedback
SEARCH THIS SITE
Copyright © China.org.cn. All Rights Reserved     E-mail: webmaster@china.org.cn Tel: 86-10-88828000 京ICP证 040089号